Up on Cripple Creek

Cannabis was legalized for recreational use in Colorado in November 2012. Not long after, our family vacationed there. Nearly everywhere we went, we encountered North Face and Patagonia-clad young adults proudly purchasing and smoking pot. They were triumphantly embracing the promises — stress relief, creativity, freedom, independence. Some had traveled from other states just to legally partake. No one seemed open to the possibility that the promises weren’t real.

Last week, I returned to Colorado — hiking Rocky Mountain National Park, visiting Colorado Springs, photographing the Garden of the Gods, rafting the Arkansas River, and worshipping at Red Rocks Amphitheatre. This time, I didn’t see those bright-eyed young adults openly smoking marijuana. Instead, I saw countless broken older adults crouched in doorways, slumped on park benches, and huddled under bridges with their weed. I watched minimum wage workers spend their breaks smoking in rusty old cars. The glamour was gone.

At one point, Jo and I watched a couple who looked to be in their 70s drag chairs from a non-smoking hotel room into a sweltering parking lot to smoke. I turned to her and half-jokingly said, “There’s an effective deterrent for young people.”

Near the end of one of our expeditions, I spotted a road sign: Cripple Creek — 10 miles. With memories of The Band’s classic song in my head, I decided we needed to check it out.

I had no idea what we were driving into.

Cripple Creek was the site of Colorado’s largest gold strike — at one time, the wealthiest community in the state. The old gold mine appears to still be operational. But anyone familiar with the gold rush history of the American West knows what followed every strike: businesses built on separating miners from their gold. Bennett Avenue is the main street through this historic western town. I counted more than ten casinos lining it. I counted two or three other businesses. The casinos were busing people in with promises of jackpots, unimaginable wealth, or at the very least a peaceful escape from life’s pressures. But I didn’t see wealth or respite. I saw people sucked into a delusion of smoke and mirrors. I saw people who were homeless, or clearly on their way there. Cripple Creek may be the saddest town I’ve ever visited.

There’s a consistent pattern in Scripture between two kinds of enterprise — businesses that genuinely serve people and add real value to communities, and businesses that exist simply to separate people from their money. The first is honorable. The second depends on deception and broken promises.

What makes the second kind so dangerous is that it never presents itself honestly. These enterprises don’t call themselves what they are. They parade as lifestyles, freedoms, and opportunities. It wasn’t personal freedom that drove the vote to legalize cannabis — it was money. It wasn’t the chance for personal wealth that legalized gambling — it was business opportunity. And it isn’t patient choice driving certain decisions in healthcare — it’s financial interest.

When a society — even one surrounded by the breathtaking beauty of Colorado — consistently chooses the promises of those who have no intention of keeping them over the wisdom of Scripture, it becomes a society of prodigals. We drift further and further from the One who actually is the way, the truth, and the life. And His promises? Those are the ones worth believing.

Thanks for Reading,

John

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